London Bridge

by Louis-Ferdinand Celine

  They strut outside right in the middle of an air-raid alert! Such perfect timing! When every cop in creation has his eyes on the embankment! Ah! They had a knack for doing exactly the right thing!…

  I congratulate them!…

  “Couldn’t they leave him here?…”

  It looked like a little smarter thing to do…

  “Why, did you want to turn him into croquettes, or what?” he asks, smart-mouthed.

  “What the hell are they going to do with him?” I ask again. “Beside making croquettes?…”

  That was the question.

  “They’re going to dump him into the drink, sugarpuss! Since you want to know! The crabs’ll gobble him up, end of story!… Satisfied, sonny?… Since you wanted the details! Can’t burn him up any more than he’s already been! Am I right? Did you get a look at his head? Ever feel like snacking on him yourself sometimes?… Somebody’s got to take care of the job! Since you couldn’t give a hoot!… Mr Hot Lips!… Mr Leaves-His-Work-Half-Finished! Mr Got-Other-Plans!… We’ve got to get cracking, move our asses for him! Got to whisk his slop away! Deal with his little you-know-whats! There, Mr Fine-Young-Man! Fantastic hero and all that jazz! Mr Got-Nothing-But-Love-on-His-Mind!”

  Now I had my answer… something to chew over… so they were having a go at me, in short… More than one person had a score to settle with me… this crew here or some other!… Just about everybody, to tell the truth… Starting with my family… with my father… my mother… Then with the cops… with Ten-Paw, others… and now with the pimps… the French Consulate… how about the Sixteenth Armoured Cavalry Division?… Wasn’t too sure about that one… with Totor, Titune, Curlers, Girouette, the Colonel, and Tartempion… I already had too much hanging over my head for one more score to change much of anything! They could all go fuck themselves! That’s how I saw it!… They just stirred up a lot of nasty memories!… Pure jealousy on their part!… That’s all!…

  Ah! I was forgetting about my pregnant girl, my angel, my cherub, my life… Ah! I don’t want them to lay a finger on her!… I’ll kill them all, damn it!… They could all take a shot at her, in a single file that stretches from earth to heaven… it wouldn’t change a damn thing about nothing, and then they could end by polishing me off! Since that’s how things were done! I wouldn’t budge an inch, I’d stand my ground, give my last drop of blood to defend my idol.

  That was my attitude! Fighting words! I chewed his ass out, laid it on the line! Ah! I sit him down! He makes a move!… Studies me a second… says to himself: “Just look at this little animal!…”

  I use the opportunity to strike. I grab him, I want the upper hand. I want to hear him say to himself: “Really, this guy’s not somebody to mess around with!”

  “They’ll hang me!” I proclaim… “And how! They’ll hang me! High! That’s right! They’ve got tons of reasons…”

  But I was fed up to my eyebrows! No more hide and seek! I’ve won! Hands down! I’m not pushing too hard! I want respect. That’s all. I drag Virginia to her feet! I want her to dance… We don’t give a hoot about the boomdaboom! We’ve seen our share of total God-awful messes! This one here doesn’t add up to more than two-three little farts!

  Cascade nabs me by the sleeve: “Hey, didn’t you see Matthew again?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Because the investigation’s still going on… maybe you’re not up on the latest?…”

  “You know damn well I’ve been busy, we were at the Colonel’s… in Willesden… You know that!…”

  “Yes, but it’s ongoing all the same… Willesden or not…”

  Right in my face. Dished it right back at me.

  “That’s the score, dickhead! Now you’ve got the info. What’ve you got to say? Still leaving tonight?”

  “No! No! Course not!…”

  All eyes on me.

  “You’re staying then?”

  “What’s it look like?”

  I don’t bat an eyelid, face them head on.

  “Hurray, old buddy! Now that’s guts for you!”

  Congrats from all around!

  “And your little lady?”

  He points to my little angel lying asleep there.

  “She’s British… I told you, it’s for her uncle…”

  I wanted them to get the story straight… she wasn’t some slut…

  “Well, if you’re going to put her to work, why’d you want to go so far away?… Isn’t she happy here with us?”

  “That’s not it, you know… not so fast…”

  He didn’t really get it.

  She woke up nice and gently.

  “Hello, miss!”

  He looks at her. He hadn’t taken a real good gander before. Now he sticks his face up close. “Say, she’s got beautiful eyes!”

  He was acting gallant, which was unusual for him. Hardly ever smiled at the ladies.

  “Goodbye, miss!”

  “Goodbye, sir!”

  Not scared off, my little sweetheart.

  He thought hard.

  “You ought to stick her in longer dresses… She looks like jailbait…”

  He was already picturing the standing gallery where his own tarts worked…

  “Ah! But you know, she’s cute!…”

  He was confident.

  “One problem though, look out for the Dagos! A word of advice. They’re wild about this type, they’re nuts… A crazy thing about blondes! They’ll snatch her off! Gone in a gust! A whirl! Wild men, take it from me. Eyeties! Scum! Isn’t that right, Prospero?… That’s how they train them down there! Right, Signor Prospero?…”

  He hawks up a huge loogie. Memories… still sort of taking their toll on him… One more time he says just like that: “Hell, miss.” A wink. Then he glances off to the side, his mind elsewhere…

  Meantime the girls are wiggling around, climbing and clambering on top of the cops! Sliding off, kissing, cuddling them for all they’re worth!… Can’t let up a single second, can’t let the cops worry about anything, they’re nice and comfy here, and here’s right where they should stay… Kiss!… Kiss!… Kiss!… Furious pawing and mauling. The girls pop off the men’s helmets, make as if they’re pissing inside. I don’t even crack a smile. The way I see it, there’s something fishy about the watchmen, they came on purpose like it was no big deal, with these out-of-it expressions, all confused, sloshed on their last legs, but really they’re having a grand old time, eyes peeled… they’re setting us up… We’re the suckers in this game!… All of a sudden the truth hits me… turns me inside out, floors me!… I think about it! And tremble!… Splutter!… Shiver from head to toe… Virginia sees me, takes my hands, I go white, red, don’t know which end is up any more… Terror stabbing through me… Just my imagination… No, not some figment! I feel myself with my hands… It’s me!… Me and nobody else!… No mistake… No way I’m dreaming at all! Shit! Hilarious! Knocked for a loop by a headache! The ache in his head, I mean, holy smoke! His stew! Not mine! His! Oh! You! You-oouu! “I’m trembling! Trembling!…” Always the same! I go red! Embarrassment!…

  “Shit! Shit! He’s back!”

  I shout over to Delphine!

  “Can you hear me, lady?” I want a look at her! “Hey, Ass-blister? He left! And he’s come back!”

  She can’t hear me, she’s outside.

  “Reduced to mush, catch that? Cream cheese! He’s revolting! reeks worse than you three hundred miles off!”

  My grand announcement.

  “Now that’s a man! A sausage!…”

  I don’t give a shit whether they’re listening to me! I don’t give a shit about their song and dance! I don’t give a shit about anything! Swept away with terror! Nobody can stand up to me! I’m thunder! Boom! Boom! I can do it all by myself like the Negro! I drop bombs! I’ve seen my share of cannonades… Five and a hundred thousand times more than all of you put together! And you can all go take a flying fuck!

  This makes me feel good! I’m making my presence felt… I’
m proud… I’m somebody. I kiss Virginia! I’ve trounced my fear. They realize it. I’m getting a round of applause.

  That wakes up Delphine – she shouts at me from the outside, screaming nasty cracks upwind…

  “Little man! Stupid little man!” she calls me…

  She’s brave enough in the dark.

  Ah! In the end I laugh it off, the hell with it all!… Scared at first, and then it’s OK… Got to grin and bear it! Ghoulish clowns! Little jokers, I’m going to lay something on you, listen up!

  Be good oh my beautiful stranger!

  For whom so many songs I have sung!

  I belt it out cold without a single sour note! That gets the whole gang back into their seats. Nobody knew I had such stage talent! I’m a big smash. I sort of play it down.

  “Hey, Cascade!” I go back on the attack. “So what about this investigation? Got nothing more to add on the subject?”

  “Go on! Go on! Keep singing! We’ll get back to that later!”

  No kind of answer.

  A few more bombs are falling again, not on Wapping, farther east, towards Chelsea… the sea…

  Little Renée and big Angèle are tearing at each other tooth and nail over the helmets… each saying they look better on herself… they try them on brimming with piss… splattering it all over… And then they break back into their cakewalk… a pretty woozy-wobbly version… all under the pink ceiling lamps. That’s where everybody’s crammed in on top of each other between the four tables… Can’t let one copper out… the matter’s settled, that’s the trick… can’t let even a single one go sniffing around outside… the clowns’ve got to come back… meet up in front of the door… Ah! Then look out, big trouble!… Sure, the bulls are slugging it back like there’s no tomorrow, but still they might have some sneaking suspicions… for example, that stink a while back… Got to show them a little more fun… always more… the way I see it, we haven’t won yet by a long shot… the ladies are hitching their dresses up to their ears… really kicking their heels!… Cascade and Prospero clap along… They’re cranking the bash back up… Hit it, ladies! Leap through the air… the cancan, the good old boom-dee-ay! Ta-ra-ra-boom! Dee-ay… Then the farandole… the cops’ve got quite a lot to keep them entertained… knickers wherever they look… thick clumps of hair through lace… pussies bouncing around… Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay! Right up against their peepers!… Through the boozy haze a mind-boggling blur… actually their eyes are starting to blink… they’re nodding off fast!… Can’t see shit… collapse on the table, heads on folded arms, they burp, they’ve had their fill…

  Fair enough, these cops are loaded to the gills with gin, but even so the wheels in my head are turning… I think they’ve seen, suspected something… they’re just putting on an act like they’re plastered… they’ve keeled over, that’d be too much to hope for…

  I do a little polka with Virginia. Then we sit back down. I want to talk to Cascade again… about what’s nagging me…

  “So how’d it all happen that you got him out of the morgue?… In pieces, such a mishmash?… On your backs?… In a cab?… A cart?… Wasn’t he happy at the morgue?…”

  I pop the question. I ask him… for the tenth time at least…

  “Why start parading him around town?… Dump him in the drink?… What’s the point?…”

  He readjusts his bowler… with a flick of his fingers… looks me up and down… I disgust him.

  “Don’t you know the first thing about this place here? Don’t you know how the system works?”

  Sorry-ass jerk that I was…

  I exasperate him, oh that’s a fact!

  “The dummy speaks English! The dummy knows it all! The dummy knows shit! Doesn’t know about exhibits for the prosecution!… Prosecusheeun!”

  He crammed his mouth full… and spit out capital letters… just like that! Prosecusheeun!

  “Mean nothing to you? It’s not just hot air, you know!… Such things do exist! Take it from me!…”

  Then he starts shaking his head, so sorry I’m thick as a brick.

  “Once they get an exhibit for the prosecusheeun on you! You’re swinging from the end of a rope! That’s where it lands you! That’s how things work around here! Do you get me now, yes or no, damn it?… Didn’t you learn back in the regiment? About exhibits for the prosecusheeun? That’s the only thing that exists! But you over there, you lie low, don’t give a shit! Rush off! Rush off! The pretty young woman runs along for some fun! He still thinks he’s fighting the war! Oh yes he does, Madame! He ditches his exhibit for the prosecusheeun! The others have just got to dump it somewhere!… Ah! You’re a darling little runt! We won’t forget you next time around!”

  He was glad for the chance to rake me over the coals…

  “Exhibit for the prosecusheeun, angel face, that’s how things work! The dead meat’s what I’m talking about, get it? Your friends are working for you, yes they are! Of course it means zero to you! Those boys are sacrificing themselves! Giving one hundred per cent! You don’t have it in you! They’re erasing your crimes! Covering up for you, Mister Goof-off! Skid Row Romeo! Ferdinand the Disgrace!”

  He was lashing out in anger.

  “Hanged? You’re asking yourself? Hanged? You better believe it! Don’t think twice! Exhibit for the prosecusheeun! You know how to speak English! Say goodbye to your miss! My dear old Récamier!…”*

  Happy with his tirade.

  Where’d he dug up Récamier, can somebody tell me? A name that meant nothing… just for effect!…

  But where’d that piece of meat get to? In the river? In its canvas sack? The whole bundle?… That’s where it must be right now… I could see the open boat… the river traffic… the drink… exhibit for the prosecusheeun! Ah! Scared shitless again! Ah! A horrible mixed-up mess, and getting worse by the minute… Ah! Heading towards a total fiasco!… Ah! I was shaking, kissing the little girl… she was clueless… hadn’t seen a thing… happened while she was asleep… I ask Cascade one more time:

  “So it’s over? They tossed it out? Hell, that’s great! We won’t bring it up any more!…”

  I wanted to put an end to this business once and for all.

  “Won’t bring it up?… Won’t bring it up?… We’ll see!”

  He still needed convincing.

  “Pet, you just keep talking… makes life easy… drags things out, it does! Drags them out… I can’t say another word…”

  “Ah! Shit, will you listen, I had nothing to do with it!…”

  I’m getting aggravated too. He’s egging me on.

  “You crack me up! Look, it’s my party!”

  I do like them, act happy-go-lucky. I grab Virginia, whisk her off, we tear into a farandole, the fact she’s knocked up doesn’t keep her from dancing! I chug down some bubbly right from the bottle… to the last drop… waltzing the whole time… glug-glug! Glug-glug!

  Here comes the lady of Paris…

  In a flash the bubbly sets all my ideas boiling… my whole head balloons… I’m twice my size… pow! I explode! Christ Almighty, it’s thunder!… It’s love!… Can’t hear myself think!… Boom! Boom! And Boom! Boom! This has nothing to do with that Claben business, damn it to hell! “Bombed-out dive! Stinking rotten!” I yell at everybody! The hyenas all cackle! “Heartless! Heartless!” I shout at them! Even the fuzz think I’m a stitch! Even Virginia is wriggling in delight at the ridiculous spectacle I’m making! Everybody dancing together, in one big long line, on two feet, on all fours, on their haunches, toads, kicking up their feet Russian-style, wriggling their whole bodies… Gisèle’s got that Russian kick down pat, Madame Gisèle they call her. She lived in Russia for eighteen years, a hooker. Nothing to sneeze at.

  Yop! Yop! You ought to see the way she leaps, springs, yelps, all around the floor. A real-life witch in a whirl once she got going… she can breathe fire too, right from her mouth, long terrific flames, from gasoline, that’s her other talent.

  “Pépé can do the same thing too, plus dan
ce Russian-style.”

  Sosthène makes sure I’m informed.

  “Too bad she’s not here now. We’d have a great time.”

  Such talents are hard to come by. Sosthène cries over his Pépé, the sudden memory of her, his dear absent love. His chest heaves with huge sobs… Ah! They give him a shake… None of that now… they drag him back into the maxixe… No gloomy Guses at my party! Virginia feels a whole lot better… she’s wide awake, doesn’t feel at all queasy any more. The ladies come over for some lovey-dovey, she gives them a kick in that skimpy outfit of hers… schoolgirl skirt… And now Sosthène’s raring to go, he drags my angel away into the dance, and they’re both off together…

  Virginia’s the more graceful of the two, no doubt about it… a sorceress… She moves to the music as light as air… Everybody looks on in admiration… she’s exquisite… the pixie of the whirlwind… swept along by the dance it’s a dream… with a driving beat… turn glide kittenish… twirl away one two three, a waltz… baby doll…

  Admiration from one and all, and some predictable jealousy… Especially Carmen had an attitude about it, the girl came on too strong for her taste, she kept making eyes at Cascade.

  “Peek-a-boo! Peek-a-boo! Take a look!” she blurts out at me…

  Just then the band was sour-noting something horrible, plus the ocarina. Curlers was on cornet. She had to keep herself busy… The half-crocked lushes choired along, each to his own tune. It must have sounded horrendous out on the dock. If the night patrol enters, barges in for a look-see, we’re going to get hauled away… The night patrol doesn’t fool around like our watchmen friends over there, our boozers, outlandish but easy-going. The night patrol’s a bunch of roughnecks, pig-headed scum, cut no breaks.

  I warn Cascade.

  “Careful! They’re yelling too loud!”

  No answer.

  “And what the hell are the boaters up to?”

  They’re taking their own good time, if you ask me.

  “All you had to do was go along and then you’d know.”

  “Are they sending it far away?”

  “I’ll say!”

  A joke.

  “You know, out to sea!… Not in front of the Chamber of Commerce!… As far out as possible… Did you ever row a boat before?” he asks.